The Man From the Society
by Swagnarok
Summary: After Conan receives a warning about the mysterious BO agent "Mezcal", a new PE teacher shows up at Teitan. Conan decides to trail him after school. Episodes 969-970.
1. Chapter 1

He sat on the toilet seat with his pants up. He held his phone up to his ear.

I swear, Conan thought. If he doesn't call me back, when he's the reason that I had to get up and leave in the first place...

"Yes?"

"Don't 'Yes' me," Conan said. "You know this is the middle of school period for me."

"Ah, well, sorry," Rei Furuya, AKA Bourbon, retorted. "You reliving your childhood is obviously more important than the latest big development within the Organization. I guess I'll just han..."

"WAIT A FRIGGIN' SECOND!" Conan said. "What is it? What's the big development?"

"There's a rumor circulating among the Men in Black," Rei said. "One of their agents has been activated onto the field."

"Speak Japanese."

(Author's Note: Haha, I guess that's like Conan's equivalent to "Speak English", whenever the person who's speaking isn't making sense)

"One of their agents has been assigned to a high-profile, top-secret mission."

"And this agent would be...?"

"Mezcal."

Mezcal, Conan repeated nonverbally. He had heard that name uttered before. "Who is he again?"

"Supposedly he's the guy who took over the development of the apotoxin project after Sherry's defection. But here's the catch: nobody knows what he looks like."

"Huuh?"

"It's like Rum all over again," Rei said. "The combined intelligence gathering of the White Organization has yet to unveil this guy's identity. And now he's on the loose, no longer confined to working behind the desk of some laboratory somewhere."

"So you've got no idea what he's after?" Conan asked.

"Well, I've officially got no leads," Rei said. "I even asked Yoko and she wouldn't tell me mum."

"Officially? So that means there's an unofficially," Conan said.

"It's more of a hunch than anything else."

"I'd like to hear your hunch."

Rei sighed. "Supposedly, this development within the Organization began two days after you and your friends discovered the buried cash from that criminal group."

"The Southpaw Case," Conan said. "If I do recall, a group photo of me and my friends was on the front page of newspapers circulating all over town."

He did a facepalm. "Haibara and Shiro were also in that picture."

"And that's my theory," Rei said. "He's after them. One, or both."

"No, they aren't after Haibara," Conan said. "Yoko's gotten a good look at her plenty of times. And I think their last run-in confirmed to Yoko that Haibara's just an ordinary girl."

"Then they're after their man," Rei said. "The one you told them you had killed."

"So we're gonna have to debunk their suspicions," Conan said. "But first things first, it's imperative that we locate Mezcal, so that we can bring Their investigation of the matter under our control."

"I couldn't agree more."

"So what do we know about Mezcal, besides what you've already told me?"

"Nothing," Rei said. "But if he's involved in pharmaceutical research and development, and especially in that pertaining to such a complex project as the apotoxin, then it's a fair bet the man has a background in biology or chemistry, or both. Such a person has got to be brilliant, or at least notably above average intelligence."

"Ehh? So it's a man, then?"

"We don't know that much, even," Rei said. "But, you know, there is one thing that troubles me."

"Yeah? And what's that?"

"You're the guy they're supposed to turn to for these kinds of investigations of persons, right?" Rei said.

He has a point, Conan thought, dismayed. They kept me out of the loop. Does that mean they don't trust me?

"I suspect things are about to get really bad," Rei said. "As though this is just the calm before the storm. Don't ask me how I know that, I've just got this ominous feeling. Well, that's all I wanted to tell you. Stay sharp, kid. And whatever you do, keep your eyes peeled for suspicious characters."

Conan nodded. "You too, Bourbon. May good fortune be still on our side looking forward."

With that, he hung up.

 **Opening**

(Cup of Trembling by B'z)

(Each fresh breath of life is a fresh chance to start anew! Spaces previously thought safe are now penetrated by the forces of darkness! Teitan Elementary has a new teacher, but can he be trusted? Perceiving the one and only truth! With the body of a child but the mind of an adult, my name is...DETECTIVE CONAN!)

Above all, I'm afraid of you seeing me like this

The youthful vigor sapped from my bones

Too afraid to proceed, too afraid to turn back

A wretch, recoiling from my own shadow

Wallowing in self-pity like a pig wallowing in its crap

I can't check my phone, lest you might try to call

I can't live at home, lest you might try to visit

All I have left is the clothes on my back and

That dreaded bottle, whose contents I dare not drink

Oh I'm going nowhere, a pinwheel spinning in circles

This Cup of Trembling I now raise to my lips and swallow

So I may face the demons haunting my restless nights

I can't show my face to you until I can call myself a man

Until I've walked a full moon carrying my cross

 **The Man From the Society! Part One!**

The six of them (Conan, Nancy, Mitsuhiko, Ayumi, Genta, and Shiro) stretched in preparation for PE Class to begin. They were outside, on the track field.

"Hey, Conan," Mitsuhiko said. "Did something happen to Haibara-san?"

"She's been absent from school a lot this past year," Ayumi said. "Is she in the hospital again?"

"Not this time, Ayumi-chan," Conan said with a grin. "Haibara's taking a sabbatical for the next week and a half."

"A what?" Genta said.

In this instance, Conan could tell the three of them were totally confused.

"A sabbatical is a periodic break," Nancy said. "Ai-chan's taking a break from school to be with her family."

"Haibara-san has a family?" Genta said.

"Yes, Genta, she wasn't lowered from the sky by a white stork," Conan said.

"Uh, no, I think what he means is...didn't Haibara-san tell us before that her parents died in a fire?" Mitsuhiko asked.

"Yeah, but that turned out to be not exactly true," Conan said. "It's complicated, but she didn't find this out until a few months ago."

"Hmm, a fire, you say?" Shiro interjected suspiciously. "What an interesting way to go out...or to fake one's own death. You wouldn't suppose that Haibara-san's parents are scientists?"

"Actually, yes," Conan said. "She did say they were researchers on some big science project."

"I see," Shiro said. "Well, it'd seem Haibara-san trusts you a lot. You knew about her break before these kids, some of her closest friends, did, after all. Maybe that's because the two of you are a lot alike?"

S**t, he knows, Conan realized.

"But, then again, what do I know?" Shiro asked innocently, walking back from his interrogative demeanor of speech. "I'm just the new kid."

"Uh, anyways," Conan said to the three Detective Boys, "don't go around telling people why Haibara's gone. She wants to keep that a secret."

"By the way," Mitsuhiko said, looking at the time on his phone. "Doesn't the teacher seem to be running a little-"

*ahem* "I do apologize for my tardiness."

A man stood before all the students.

The student body immediately broke out into confused whispers.

"Order, please!" the man barked.

There was silence.

"Thank you," the man said. "Your former PE teacher will no longer be with you from this point on. I am his replacement. My name is Kanehiko Torishima."

Kanehiko, age 59, was a somewhat taller than average man. His most immediately striking feature was his big white beard. He was wearing jogging clothes.

One student raised his hand.

"If you're going to ask about my beard, lower your hand," he said.

The student lowered his hand.

"I would like to take the day to run some tests," he continued. "I'll be weighing and measuring the height of each and every one of you. Then, I'll use the data obtained to calculate your BMI."

There was some more confused chatter.

"BMI stands for Body Mass Index," he said. "One can derive a person's BMI by dividing body weight with height. People with a high BMI number have more body fat, usually. A little bit of body fat is alright, but a lot of people have too much body fat. Way too much. That's bad: being fat is bad for your self-image and confidence but, more importantly, it's bad for your health, and you won't live as long if you stay fat all your life. I can see that some of you here are visibly fat: for however much time we have together, I'd like to see all of us move towards a healthier way of living and towards a more ideal BMI. Now, if you'll please follow me to the gym..."

 **Scene Transition**

"What's the matter, Genta-kun?" Ayumi asked.

"Yeah, you've been really quiet ever since PE let out," Mitsuhiko said.

"The new teacher says I'm going to die young," Genta said, opening up his locker.

"W-well, I don't think he meant it like that," Nancy said.

"Yo, Genta," Shiro said.

Genta turned and faced the boy.

"You and me," Shiro said. "Whatever sport you want."

"Huh?"

"You want to be more healthy, right?" Shiro said. "Exercise is a way to do it. Pick some kind of outdoor thing or exercise that sounds fun to you, and I'll be your partner."

"Eeh? Really?" Genta said, grateful. "Okay, gimme a day to think about it."

"Hey, come to think of it, where's Conan?" Mitsuhiko asked.

 **Scene Transition**

"Friday night? Yeah, sure. Where are we-"

Conan slammed the door open and stepped into the teacher's lounge.

"Um, I'm sorry, I'm going to have to call you back," Kobayashi said.

"Wait," Shiratori said. "Why...?"

But Kobayashi had already hung up. She bent down to Conan's level.

"Do you need something, Conan-kun?"

"Kobayashi-sensei," Conan said in his childish voice. "I was wondering about the new teacher."

"Huh?"

"The new PE instructor, Torishima-sensei," Conan said. "What's his background?"

"And why would you need to know something like that, Conan-kun?" Kobayashi said with a chuckle.

"Please, it's important," Conan begged.

Kobayashi sighed. "Alright, don't tell anybody I told you this, okay?"

Conan nodded.

"From what I've heard, he's way overqualified for this job," Kobayashi said. "He's got a teaching position at a medical school, and he's written about 30 scholarly papers. And he was making pretty good money over there too, like ¥6,000,000 a year. But apparently, effective two days ago he handed in his immediate resignation from his tenured position to come teach elementary schoolers here. Kind of doesn't make sense, huh?"

Conan didn't answer.

"Hmm? Conan-kun? You look like there's something the matter."

"N-no, it's nothing," Conan said. "Hey, um, if you could please not tell anyone I came here asking about the new teacher..."

And with that, he ran out.

 **Scene Transition**

Huh? she thought.

Nancy's phone vibrated. It was a message from Conan.

She read it out loud:

"Go on home without me, I'll be out late probably. Tell Kogoro and Eri that I'm at the Professor's place working on a school project with Haibara."

In other words, you're doing something dangerous again, Nancy thought. I wonder what it is this...

Then from a distance she saw it: Conan opened the door to a small vehicle and climbed in the back, closing the door behind him.

"What the h**l are you doing this time," she mumbled.

"Ehh? Nancy-chan?" Ayumi said. "What are staring at?"

"...Nothing," Nancy said. "Let's go."

A few seconds later, she saw the new teacher climb into the driver's seat of that same vehicle. And then he drove away, with Conan inside.

 **Scene Transition**

This is bad, Conan realized.

Just as he was inserting the tracker underneath the driver's seat, Kanehiko suddenly just came inside outta nowhere and started the car. Now he couldn't get out.

Conan crouched down behind the driver's seat. He was momentarily disoriented when Torishima suddenly pulled the front seat up.

Torishima looked through his rear-view mirror.

The car in front hit a red light. Accordingly, Torishima pushed down on the breaks.

*thud*

"Hmm? Is someone back there?!" Torishima demanded. "Show yourself!"

Conan readied his wristwatch. He aimed.

Torishima leaned over and turned his head around...Conan fired.

It ricocheted off of the man's glasses, leaving a big crack in them.

"Gah!" Torishima said.

Hoping that he'd be momentarily disoriented, Conan tried the car door.

It wouldn't open.

"Heh? You're one of my students, aren't you?" Torishima said. "What did you just do to my glasses?"

Conan could only think of one thing left to do.

" _S_ - _Sumimasen_!" Conan said childishly. "I was playing hide and seek with my friends and I thought this car would be a good place to hide."

Torishima sighed. "What's your name?"

"Conan Edogawa."

"Ah, your parents must've been mystery lovers, then," Torishima said. "Do you live around here, Conan-kun?"

"Close by," Conan said.

"Close enough to walk home?"

"W-well I don't know our bearings, so..."

The car behind honked.

Torishima, remembering about the light, looked forwards and pushed down on the accelerator.

"Look, Conan-kun, I've got business to attend to now and it'll be a few hours before I'll be free to leave. Until then, you're just going to have to wait outside."

"Outside? Can't I wait inside with you, sir? Where there's air conditioning?"

"Where I'm going doesn't allow children," Torishima said. "It's a sacred space, not to be readily defiled by outsiders. Strap yourself in."

Conan did so.

"Well, I guess I can leave the air conditioner inside the car on, though I hate having to do so for so long," Torishima said. "

"How long's it going to be in there?" Conan asked.

"About two hours, maybe two and a half. You, know, I think you should just call your parents and ask them to come get you. If you don't know where to tell them, just say you're along Himawari Street. That's where my business is. Ah, speaking of which...we're here."

Torishima parked the car and opened the door.

" _Ojisan_ ," Conan said, "What kind of...business is this?"

"..."

Hmm? Conan thought. He doesn't want to tell me, for some reason? I don't see any bars or strip clubs or adult entertainment centers on this street. This isn't known to be a red-light district either. So what reason would he have to be embarrassed about-

"...You're just a child, so I guess it's safe to tell you," Torishima said. "I'm meeting with the fellow members of my society. An organization shrouded in secrecy, its inner workings a mystery to the general public."

C-Could it be...?! Conan thought, alarmed.

"You won't tell anybody what I just told you, right, Conan-kun?"

He took off his damaged glasses and looked Conan straight in the eye, a fierce expression on his face.

Conan couldn't even swallow.

Is this him? he thought. Is this the one Bourbon was talking about? Mezcal? Is he about to meet with the Organization? If I don't answer him I'll look suspicious. But what should I...what did he even ask me...huh?

Torishima had gone on ahead already.

 _Kuso_ , I need proof of we're gonna stop him, Conan thought.

Torishima had ascended an outside staircase to the second floor of a brick building. At the top of the staircase was a doorway leading inside. Standing at that doorway was a man.

That man at the door was dressed funny, like a soldier from a 19th century European army. And of course, Conan couldn't overlook that the man was holding a sword.

Not like that's legal in Japan, Conan thought. But still, what's with the get-up? Whatmore, he's openly brandishing that sword. This doesn't match their MO at all.

The man let Torishima inside.

Whatever, Conan thought. Funny dress or not, that guy's job is to stand guard, to make sure people like like me can't get in. He's all that stands between me and Mezcal so...Here goes nothing!

He got out of the car through the left door and snuck around the corner of the brick complex.

He turned a knob on his bowtie and...

"YAAAAHHH! SOMEBODY HELP! PLEASE, HE'S GOING TO KILL ME!"

As the guard came running, Conan ran in the opposite direction.

He circled around and climbed the staircase.

Before the guard could catch a good look of him, and swung the door open wide and ran inside. Gravity caused the door to slam shut after him. Conan locked it so the man with the sword couldn't follow him in.

 **Scene Transition**

He found himself in some kind of entrance hall. There was a closed double door.

He put his ear to the door, but he could hardly make out anything that way.

Very slowly he opened one of the two doors, slowly enough that there wouldn't be any creaking. Or at least in theory, anyway. The creaking was ultimately unavoidable. He just hoped nobody heard it. He heard one of them say:

"Will we open with a word of prayer?"

They aren't the Men in Black, he realized, a deadpan look on his face.

He opened the door and got a good look at them all. There was no Gin, no Vodka, nobody that he recognized. Just a bunch of middle-aged men in strange costumes.

"Who the h**l let this kid in?" one of them demanded.

Torishima stood up and ran straight to Conan.

"Didn't I tell you you can't be in here?" he said sternly.

"Oy, Kanehiko, you know his kid?"

"Y-yeah, kind of..."

 **Scene Transition**

"So you're all Freemasons?" Conan asked, now standing in the middle of the large elaborately decorated room.

"Yeah," Torishima, the group's appointed Deacon, said. "This place here is Beika Masonic Lodge no. 7, and we're associated with the Grand Lodge of Japan."

"Our group only has six members," Matt Tenant, age 36, the man with the sword, said. "They're all present and accounted for today."

"You interrupted us in the middle of our ceremony, boy," Mitsuharu Ninomiya, age 40, Worshipful Master of the Lodge, said. "That wasn't cool."

"Eeh, I think we can excuse his impertinence this once," John Lohan, age 42, the Secretary-Treasurer, said. "Conan-kun, do you know what Freemasonry is?"

Conan nodded. "It's a centuries-old secret society, its proceedings steeped in ritualism related to the historic craft of stonemasonry. To join, one must be of good moral fiber and believe in a creator deity."

"Very good," Sangoro Takatsugu, age 46, the Senior Warden, said. "Sounds like you could make for a fine member one day."

"Speaking of members," Hikaru Sarugakure, age 41, the Junior Warden, said, "today we hold that matter up to vote, right? The inclusion of two new members."

Matt sighed. "I hardly see the point. That person's just gonna veto it again."

"After today, that's going to change," Hikaru said.

"Heeh?" Mitsuharu said. "Hikaru, you got the necessary backing?"

"Yeah," Hikaru said. "I got the petition of everyone here. So before we hold the vote on new members, I would like to motion in favor of voting on the proposed amendment to our rules of procedure."

"Huh?" Conan said.

"Confused, aren't you?" Torishima said to the boy. "Whenever we freemasons are considering letting a new guy join our ranks, we hold it up to a vote."

"But here's the kicker," Hikaru said. "It only takes one 'Nay' vote to prohibit the person from joining. And it's all done by secret ballot, by means of dropping a white ball for yes and a black cube for nay."

"That's the way the Masons have always done things," Sangoro said. "And usually there aren't any major problems with this. But one person here has betrayed the sacred trust of the Masons, misused the power of the veto to sabotage our group from within."

"Hikaru proposes that we require two votes to blackball a candidate," Mitsuharu said. "We never wanted to resort to such a large break in Masonic tradition, but we're kind of desperate for new members right now."

There was a pause.

"Wait, why did we tell this random kid all this?" Matt asked.

"He's an old soul, that's why," Torishima said.

*laughter*

That remark was a little too close to home for Conan's comfort though.

"Um, so is it alright with you guys if Conan-kun sits in on today's meet?" Torishima asked.

"Whoa there," Lohan said. "Him interrupting us at the start is one thing, but this boy actually sitting in as we conduct our Masonic practices? That's a little much, don't you think?"

Hikaru shrugged. "I don't mind. And who knows today might spark a chain of events that one day leads to him becoming a Masonic brother."

 **Scene Transition**

"The top part of any building is its central component," Sangoro said. "I've never been in a home or office that didn't have a ceiling or roof, save ten years ago when I was briefly involved with a hurricane relief effort and saw some having been torn off."

The main chamber room of the Masonic Hall was rectangular in shape. Assuming that the entrance to the chamber room was on its left side, the Worshipful Master Mitsuharu sat on a throne located on the far right side of the room, surrounded by the Secretary-Treasurer Lohan and the Deacon Torishima. On the south side sat the Junior Warden Hikaru, by himself. As the Tiler (the person who keeps guard at the entrance to Masonic Lodges), Matt Tenant wasn't present in the room. All seats faced the center. Conan sat next to Hikaru. Sangoro was the one standing in the center, giving the presentation.

Starting a few feet from the room's entrance and ending near its approximate center was an 8x8 black and white tile grid, strongly resembling a chessboard. Then was a round seal in the center of the room; at the center of the round seal was a pedestal. On that pedestal was a book. On closer inspection that book was the _Nihon Shoki_ , an ancient Japanese text detailing the classic myths and legends of the Japanese people.

"When you think about it, a ceiling is something that holds you back," Sangoro said. "At night it blocks your view of the stars. You cannot go up without eventually bumping your head on the ceiling. Indeed, man has even devised terms like 'glass ceiling' to refer to the structural limits women face in trying to ascend the ladder of upward mobility."

"But as they hold stuff in, they also keep things out," he continued. "Unwelcome things like rain, hail, lighting, and snow. Every home needs a roof, because as much as we may dislike the limits they impose on us, we need them. Gentlemen, I would now like to address you concerning the worldwide explosion in artificial intelligence and the coming technological singularity."

 **Scene Transition**

The presentation was over. They all headed to the entrance hall. Conan hadn't noticed it earlier, but there was a table lined against the wall with refreshments, food and drink.

As Conan enjoyed his chicken salad sandwich:

"How did you like it, Conan-kun?" Torishima asked. "The whole was way over your head, I'll bet."

Conan shook his head. "Actually, I thought he was fascinating. And he seemed very well-researched in the subject matter. But I would raise an objection to his main premise."

"Oh? And what's that?"

"That the replacement of homo sapiens by supremely advanced artificial intelligence is necessarily a bad thing," Conan said. "When we think of computers, we think of high computing power, the ability to rapidly perform mathematical calculations. But he seems to have forgotten intelligence is a very wide-encompassing term. There's conventional intelligence, but then there's also emotional and social intelligence. We think of computers as void of emotional and spiritual components, but what if the AI of the future turns out to be more human than any of us? What if, to them, we're the cold, lifeless machines?"

"Well, that's a very mature response from you, Conan-kun," Torishima said, clearly a bit shocked.

In the background, nobody noticed as Hikaru opened the door and headed back into the main chamber room.

"I must say, that was an excellent presentation," Lohan said.

"Oh, no, it wasn't as good as the ones you usually do, John-san," Sangoro said. "But on this subject, concerning your presentation last time you weren't completely clear on the nature of the distinction between-"

And then the lights went out.

 **Scene Transition**

Haibara tapped her foot impatiently.

They never said anything about this, she thought, feeling somewhat betrayed.

And then the van door opened. The doctor stepped inside.

"You're clean," he said. "You'll be taken up ahead shortly, thank you for your cooperation."

" _Oi_ , was it really necessary to X-Ray me?" Haibara asked, teed off.

"Yes," the doctor said bluntly. "Your parents would've never agreed to this otherwise."

"And how am I?" Haibara asked.

"You're a perfectly healthy girl," the doctor said cheerfully. "We detected no...complications, so there's no reason to detain you here any longer. It's good to see you again, Shiho-chan."

"Huuh?"

"Oh, confused?" he said with a chuckle. "I used to be your physician when you were really little. I even remember you biting me once when I was trying to administer your flu shot."

Sounds like something I would do, she thought with a deadpan look.

"But I guess you wouldn't remember any of that," he said.

"Actually...wait, are you...Daizu- _sensei_?!"

"Yup! Long time no see! I'd say you haven't aged a day, but I guess we both know that isn't technically true. But we'll have more time to catch up later: right now your family's waiting."

 **Scene Transition**

It was about five minutes before the lights turned back on.

"Well, that was...unexpected," Mitsuharu said.

"In the sixteen years I've been coming here the power's never gone out even once," Lohan said.

"So I called the people downstairs and they say it went out for them too," Sangoro said.

The problem was fixed too quickly for it to have been from a downed power line, Conan thought. So what could it have...

"WAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

Upon hearing Sangoro's scream they all rushed straight from the chamber room, where they saw:

"H-Hikaru?!" Lohan said.

Mitsuharu whipped out his phone to dial 110.

Matt entered at that point. "W-what is this?! Is Hikaru dead?! Why the h*ll is he-"

"Look!" Conan exclaimed, pointing to the floor surrounding Hikaru.

On each black or white tile Hikaru had made a bloody handprint. Hikaru's dead body (cause of death was a knife wound to the stomach) had its hand stretched out, touching one particular tile, which also had a bloody handprint.

"This is...!" Torishima began.

"A dying message," Conan said.

(Author's Note: View the "Dying Message" chapter for details on what the victim's message looked like.)

 **Ending**

( _Hoshi Monogatari_ by Egoist)

I know you've taken this from my cold dead fingertips

I wrote this to tell you what I never had the nerve to say

Because I know that right now, you're punishing yourself

Because you of all people deserve to know the whole story

Once I was only a child, but I was old enough to understand

Something important was missing, though I didn't know what

I wandered in the dark, calling to the crowd, "Excuse me, sirs!"

"Somebody, anybody, please, tell me what I'm doing wrong!"

Finally, on the starry night of Tanabata, I looked out my window

And said, "Kami-sama, if you could let me have a friend, just one.

One who's true and faithful, and funny, but most of all spirited.

This one thing I ask, and I'll never ask for anything ever again."

And then I met you, and in what seemed like an eternity I had

The chance to know you, and for the first time I was really happy

It never ended, you see, that initial bliss: it grew, as we grew closer

Thank you, my one and dearest friend, for teaching me how to love

 **To Be Continued**

 **Next Conan's Hint** : Knight


	2. Dying Message

There are 64 tiles, on an 8x8 grid. Hikaru Sarugakure did, in his final moments, cover his hand in blood from the fatal wound which his murderer inflicted upon him and pressed it against the tiles, forming handprints.

The following tiles have a bloody handprint:

A1 B1 C1 D1 E1 F1 G1 H1

A2 B2 C2 D2 E2 F2 G2 H2

A3 B3 C3 D3 E3 F3 G3 H3

A4 B4 C4 D4 F4 G4 H4

A5 B5 C5 D5 E5 F5 G5 H5

A6 B6 C6 E6 F6 G6 H6

A7 B7 D7 E7 F7 G7 H7

A8 B8 C8 D8 F8 G8 H8

Hikaru's hand rests on F2.


	3. Chapter 2

It wasn't long before police officers had swarmed the lodge.

"*sigh* And it would seem that we find you at the scene of a murder once again, Conan-kun," Megure said. "Where's Mouri-san? Or are your friends with you?"

"Actually, Inspector, it's just me this time," Conan said.

"Oh? This has happened to you before, Conan-kun?" Torishima said.

"M-more or less, yeah," Conan said.

More or less? Megure thought, taken back by the scope of this boy's penchant for understatements.

Megure cleared his throat. "So could someone tell me what happened here?"

 **Scene Transition**

Megure took a good look at the bloody handprints. "Hmm, so this was his dying message, you say?"

"That would seem to be the most sound conclusion," Torishima said. "There's exactly one on each tile, meaning this most likely wasn't the result of him flailing around desperately on the floor."

"But I can't make heads or tails of it," Mitsuharu said, and the others nodded. "If he wanted to leave a dying message, you'd think he'd make it easier to understand."

No, Conan thought. The dying message clearly implicates That Person as the culprit. What I need now is solid evidence.

 **Opening**

(Cup of Trembling by B'z)

(Each fresh breath of life is a fresh chance to start anew! A cryptic dying message, a secretive fraternal society, and...Mezcal? With the body of a child but the mind of an adult, my name is...DETECTIVE CONAN!)

Above all, I'm afraid of you seeing me like this

The youthful vigor sapped from my bones

Too afraid to proceed, too afraid to turn back

A wretch, recoiling from my own shadow

Wallowing in self-pity like a pig wallowing in its crap

I can't check my phone, lest you might try to call

I can't live at home, lest you might try to visit

All I have left is the clothes on my back and

That dreaded bottle, whose contents I dare not drink

Oh I'm going nowhere, a pinwheel spinning in circles

This Cup of Trembling I now raise to my lips and swallow

So I may face the demons haunting my restless nights

I can't show my face to you until I can call myself a man

Until I've walked a full moon carrying my cross

 **The Man From the Society! Part Two!**

A few seconds before the power had gone out, the victim, Hikaru Sarugakure, went off from the group and entered the chamber room where the Masonic proceedings took place. There were no windows anywhere on that Masonic complex, which was located on the second floor of the building, so nobody inside could see squat for those roughly five minutes in which the lighting went out. Matt Tenant, the Tiler, stood watch outside the entire time, initially unaware of what was going on, until he received a text from Mitsuharu. During that time, he spotted nobody coming and going from the entrance to the Masonic Lodge. The power on the first floor also went out. The police found evidence to such that some kind of remote timing mechanism caused the power to go out. Cause of death was a knife wound to the stomach; the knife was found some fair distance from the body. The police would prove unable to lift any fingerprints off of the knife, which had apparently been thoroughly scrubbed of such and of DNA ahead of time, though obviously the victim's DNA was found on it (but not his fingerprints, which would suggest that the culprit was the one who removed it, probably in order to open the sound for a quicker loss of blood and to make it more difficult for the victim to use it against the culprit). The victim's phone was also lying on the floor some distance from the victim. The SD Card had been removed and crushed underfoot so that it'd be impossible to obtain the call or text history from the phone, or for the victim to type up a dying message. The culprit's fingerprints could not be lifted from the phone either; barring the possibility of this being an elaborate suicide plot, it was clear that the culprit had worn gloves. However, such were yet to have been found. The suspects were searched, even Conan (under the suspicions that the culprit may have hidden the gloves on Conan's person). When this yielded nothing, the police set out to find the gloves, hoping that a DNA sample of the culprit might be obtained from them.

" _Keibu_!" Chiba announced. "The search of the restroom and toilets yielded no gloves!"

"WHAT?!" Megure said. "Then how did the culprit-"

"Maybe it wasn't gloves, Inspector," Conan said. "Anything that the culprit could've wrapped around the knife handle would've worked, right?"

"The kid has a point," Megure said. "Chiba-kun!"

" _Hai_! _Wakarimashita_! We'll begin searching the premises for something like that immediately!"

"Say, do you think it could've been a shirt?" Lohan asked.

"Huh?"

"The culprit could've taken his shirt off and used it to grip the handle, right?" Lohan suggested.

"No way," Sangoro said. "That would've yielded a bunch of the culprit's skin cells and stuff on the murder weapon, isn't that right, Kanehiko?"

"Y-yeah," Torishima said. "Unless the blade was wrapped in the outside of the shirt, which didn't come into contact with the culprit's body."

"Say, Kanehiko," Mitsuharu said. "I noticed you're not wearing your glasses today. What's up with that?"

"Hmmm? Do you mean to suggest that I'm more suspicious than everyone else for this fact?"

"Answer the dang question," Mitsuharu said.

"U-uh, actually, that was my fault," Conan said sheepishly.

He took thirty seconds to explain what he did to Torishima's glasses, though of course he left out the part where he used a tranquilizer dart to accomplish such.

"Um, I'd just like to point out that I couldn't have done it," Matt said. "It was pitch black in this whole place, right? Surely everyone would've noticed if I opened the door and came inside to commit the crime."

"But what if you were inside the whole time?" Megure objected.

"That's impossible, Inspector," Sangoro said. "As soon as the power went out I called Matt and had him rush downstairs and get somebody from the floor beneath us on the line."

"By extension, I guess that clears Sangoro also, right?" Matt said. "I mean, could he had made that phone call and murdered Hikaru at the same time? Wouldn't the sound of Hikaru screaming have been audible to that woman on the other end?"

"Uh, no, actually there weren't any screams from the victim," Lohan said. "Not that I could hear, anyways. How about you guys?"

They all shook their heads as to indicate no, they hadn't heard anything.

"What I want to know is why anyone would want to kill Hikaru," Torishima said.

"It must've been the vote," Lohan said. "It was scheduled for what, 20 to 30 minutes before he was killed? If that advanced as planned, I think he would've succeeded in overturning the traditional rules stating that a single nay vote can veto the accession of a new Lodge member."

"The only reason the culprit would have to prevent that was if the culprit was the same person as the serial vetoer," Matt said.

"But still," Mitsuharu said. "I like our group as much as the next guy, but is all this really important to kill someone over?"

"You tell me," Sangoro said.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Mitsuharu retorted.

"I think we've all heard the rumors," Torishima said. "Hikaru was going to challenge your spot as Worshipful Master come next election, right?"

"Killing him on the day of the overhaul vote might divert attention away from that fact and make the culprit's motive seem like something else entirely," Lohan suggested.

There was a pause.

"Well, I'm not saying he did it," Lohan said. "I'd just like to make sure we cover all possible angles of this crime. Until some hard evidence is found, everything we're saying now is mere conjecture."

Nobody noticed as Conan was examining the chairs in the chamber room; his eye caught sight of something and he grinned.

If that's the case, then, he must have used...

" _O_ - _oi_!"

He could only protest weakly as Chiba picked him up and carried him out of the room.

"Conan-kun, why don't you head on home now," Chiba said. "This isn't a place for children."

"B-but..."

"YOU!"

Kogoro came storming into the chamber hall.

"Uncle," Conan said, more than a little surprised. "How did you know where I was?"

"It's all over the news," Kogoro said, taking out his phone.

It was open to a webpage, a news website. At the top it read:

"Breaking: Murder at Local Masonic Temple"

"Ehh?" Conan said. "How'd you find me just from that?"

"I didn't," Kogoro said. "I called the Inspector asking if he needed my expertise and then he told me you were here."

Expertise, Conan repeated sarcastically under his breath. Right.

Still, he thought, now that Uncle's here, there's someone for me to use as my mouthpiece as I...

He felt his arm being tugged at.

"Come on," Nancy said, a teed look on her face. "Let's go, mom's waiting in the car."

"What? No!" Conan said, shaking his hand free.

"Excuse me?"

"I know who did it, and I'm so close to finding the proof I need," Conan said. "Just gimme thirty minutes to wrap this all to a close."

Nancy sighed. "Don't forget."

Then she went out the door.

Conan tugged at Torishima's shirt.

"Hmm?"

"Torishima-sensei, there's something I need to ask you," Conan said.

"Is it about the beard?" Torishima asked.

Conan smirked. "No, I think I've got that much figured out."

"Ohh?"

"You're an Ainu, right?"

(Author's Note: The Ainu are the true indigenous peoples of Japan, especially of Hokkaido. They likely have a common genetic heritage with the indigenous people of the Russian Far East, with the Inuit peoples in Alaska and Canada, and with the native peoples of the United States.)

"How did you know?"

"The beard. Your facial features seem somewhat un-Japanese, but not enough for you to be of European stock. Furthermore, you have a Japanese name. So you aren't a foreigner. I doubt that Teitan Elementary's school board would tolerate such a gross deviation from the norms of proper dress by a non-foreigner, so I'm guessing they allowed it after you explained to them that you sport a beard to honor the traditions of your Ainu ancestors, who were known for their large amounts of facial hair."

Torishima clapped. "Bravo, Conan-kun. So what was it you wanted to ask me?"

Conan signaled for him to bend down to Conan's level, and Torishima obliged. Then Conan whispered something in his ear.

"Eeeehhh? And how did you figure that out?" Torishima said. "Indeed, all of us but That Person have been a part of this group for less than fifteen years. He should've been made Worshipful Master a long time ago, considering the downright slavish amount of devotion he's shown behind the scenes towards keeping everything running smoothly. Why do you ask? Surely you don't think that he's...Hey!"

Conan had ditched him and was instead flipping through the pages of that book on the pedestal.

So that's how he did it, he thought with a big grin. Alright then: time to put Uncle to sleep.

He aimed his stun-gun wristwatch at Kogoro's neck and fired.

 **Scene Transition**

"Well, how do I look?"

After a lengthy helicopter ride Haibara/Shiho had been brought to a cabin overlooking the beach, with a gazebo sitting on a cliff looming above the beautiful, restless waters.

When she arrived, she was given a pill. She recognized it as the one that was given to Ran Mouri whenever it became necessary for her to assume her new identity of Nancy Akechi, and also the pill that Shinichi used to return to his child form after his frequent rendezvous-es with the Organization.

That old pain, akin to one's bones melting, was notably diminished this time for some strange reason. It hurt a little bit but then it was over: she was an adult again.

After that, she took a twenty minute shower. After that, she was given something nice to change into in preparation for dinner with her family: a flowing reddish-brownish dress of about knees-length. It was sleeveless and collarless. Likewise, an imitation pearl necklace was given to her, and an older Korean lady fixed her hair nice.

Elena, Atsushi, and Satoshi looked at Shiho. All were stunned, not just by how she looked but a the realization of what this represented: their daughter (or sister, to Satoshi) had gone from being a little girl last time they saw her to a young woman.

Atsushi could hardly contain himself. He got up and stepped out for a moment in order to regain his composure.

"Do a twirl for your mother," Elena said.

Shiho obliged, making a quick 360 degree turn.

"You look...amazing," Elena said. "Please, have a seat."

Shiho sat down at the table.

Atsushi returned and sat back down.

"Does all this feel weird to you, Shiho?" Atsushi asked.

"A-a little, yeah," Shiho admitted. "I mean, for so long I thought you were dead, and here I am, sitting down to eat with my family."

"If only Akemi could've been here," Satoshi said.

Shiho was saddened by this reminder that a member of the family could not be present today."

Atsushi gently grasped Shiho's hand. "Hey, you'll see her again soon. We all will. One day all five of us will sit down and enjoy a nice meal together, as a family complete."

"But why not now, dad?" Shiho asked, her face a little wet by this point.

"Because the time isn't right yet," Elena said. "The Men in Black, those people whose depravity you know first-hand...if they were to ever discover your sister alive and in the flesh, they'll know that their enemies have the same weapon they do, or even that we're still alive, even after we've been presumed dead for a decade now. They'll capture her, and use her as a weapon against us. And we can't afford anything that would derail the plan."

Shiho pulled her arm free. "So where does that leave me?"

"Hmm?"

"If they ever get their hands on me," Shiho began...

"That's why you've got to go back," Elena said. "To being that girl, Ai Haibara. Enjoy this present getaway, because after this, I suspect it'll be a while before you're able to see us again."

"Where are we anyway?" Shiho asked.

"We can't tell-"

Atsushi put his hand on his wife's shoulder. "Hey, come on. If she's ever compromised, they'll know about us anyway, and then it'll scarce matter where we hide."

Elena sighed. "This place is our safe house, located on the island of Shikoku. When we first faked our deaths and set about hiding ourselves from the Organization all those years ago, we came here. Since then, it's been something of private villa for us, a place where we could go when we needed the occasional break from the responsibilities of stopping the ruin of our world."

"Four bagels with a cream cheese and blueberry spread, with bowls of ham bone soup as your side."

The waiter put everything down on the table.

Haibara thought the waiter looked familiar. "Wait, you wouldn't happen to be..."

She gasped. "You're Jirokichi-san's butler!"

Hitoshi Kamiya smiled. "Yup, he lent me to the Miyanos for this family reunion."

This left Shiho even more confused.

"Oh, Jirokichi-san and us go way back," Atsushi said. "This level piece of beachfront property belongs to the Suzuki family: anytime we ask he lets us live here for a while."

"It was a member of his family who founded the Organization in the first place," Elena said. "So I guess he feels like it's his duty to aid its enemies however he can."

"Heeh? So the Suzuki family knows about the Organization?!" Shiho said.

"Well, not really," Satoshi said. "That rich girl you sort of know...what's her name?"

"Sonoko?"

"Yeah, her," Satoshi said. "I highly doubt she would be let in on any of it. I'm not sure that even her mom and dad know."

"Thank you, Hitoshi-kun," Elena said.

Hitoshi bowed politely and left.

Shiho took a look at her food, hesitating.

"...Is something wrong?" Atsushi asked.

"N-no," Shiho said meekly. "It's...nothing."

"Heh, don't tell me you think we spiked your food," Satoshi teased.

But by the look on her face, it would seem that was exactly what she was thinking.

"If you still don't fully trust us, that's fine," Elena said. "We must seem like a bunch of strangers to you, after all."

"No, that's not it!" Shiho declared resolutely, proceeding to tear into her food voraciously.

The weather on the beach remained lovely the whole day.

 **Scene Transition**

Everyone gathered around Mouri- _tantei_.

"I would like to start with a question," Conan/Kogoro said. "Have any of you gentlemen ever considered suspending your membership with this Masonic Lodge?"

"Eeh? What kind of question is that?" Mitsuharu demanded.

"Just answer honestly, if you will," Conan/Kogoro said.

There was a general hesitation, as though nobody wanted to be the first to speak up.

"I'll take that as a yes," Conan/Kogoro said. "I'd like to ask why you haven't done so, but instead of answering right now I'd like for all of you to think about that. Here's what happened: the culprit sent Sarugakure-san a text message, asking him to go wait in chamber room, so that they could talk in private about something. Then, the timing mechanism went off and took out the power to this building. As soon as this happened, he dashed for the door leading into the chamber. Aided by the light on his phone, the culprit then proceeded to stab Sarugakure-san, confident that the gloves he was wearing would prevent the police from finding fingerprints on the blade. Then he destroyed the phone, so that the police couldn't later check out Sarugakure-san's phone and figure out who sent him the text."

"After this was done," Conan/Kogoro continued, "there was the matter of disposing of the gloves, which, if found by the police, would surely provide them with a sample of the culprit's DNA. The trick was simple: using a glue stick, he applied that adhesive substance to the edges of four pages of that book sitting on display in the middle of the room, the Nihon Shoki. He ripped the gloves, which were probably made out of latex, into long flat strips, put them in between the two glued pages, and then stuck the pages together. This is to say that, even if the police examined the book, they'd be unlikely to find the gloves. However, he was unable to prevent some traces of Sarugakure-san's blood from getting on the book. In any case, examine the book again, find the glued pages, separate these pages and there you should find the gloves."

"Do this and you should find Lohan-san's DNA on the gloves," Conan/Kogoro said.

Every eye turned to John Lohan.

The exposed killer sank to his knees. "...How did you know?"

"It was the dying message," Conan/Kogoro explained.

"T-the dying message?!" Sangoro said. "But that's just a bunch of gibberish, isn't it?"

"No, Sarugakure-san knew exactly what he was doing," Conan/Kogoro said. "Remember: his hand rested on F2, if we were to think of the black and white tiles like it's a chessboard. Four spaces have no bloody handprint: E4, D6, E8, and C7. His code was actually really easy to understand, once it's explained."

"Code?" Megure said.

"It's called the Knight's Tour," Conan/Kogoro said. "A centuries-old puzzle: on a chessboard, how do you maneuver a knight so that it hits every space exactly one time? On a 5x5 board, there are 1,728 possible solutions. On a 6x6 board, that's 6.6 million combinations. For a 7x7 board, you have 165 billion different ways of solving the puzzle. As for an 8x8 board, well, we've yet to figure out how many possible solutions there are."

"Hikaru was always pretty good at chess," Matt Tenant said.

"Indeed," Conan/Kogoro said. "He played the board so masterfully that when the dust settled, exactly four spaces remained. From F2, the next reachable space was E4, then D6, then E8, and finally C7. So that's the order of the numbers: 4, 6, 8, and 7. Shorten the way that the numbers are pronounced in Japanese, and you get:

Yon

Ro(kyu)

Ha(chi)

Na(na)

"Yon Rohana," Conan/Kogoro said. "A somewhat imperfect Japanese rendering of his killer's name."

(Author's Note: Though in Japanese 4 is usually pronounced as "shi" and 7 as "shichi", they can also be pronounced as "yon" and "nana", respectively.)

John Lohan sighed. "I guess there's no point in resisting further."

"Why?!" Mitsuharu demanded, grabbing his murderous comrade by the shirt collar. "Why did you kill him?!"

"About that," Conan/Kogoro said. "I'd like someone now to answer the question I asked earlier: why didn't you leave the group if you wanted to?"

Torishima stepped forward. "I guess I'll be that guy. I feared that, considering how tiny our group is, if I left that might cause everyone else to jump ship on this shrinking club of ours, and that'd be the end of the Beika Masonic Lodge."

Sangoro nodded. "I thought the same thing."

"Same here," Mitsuharu said.

Matt Tenant nodded in agreement.

"So that you could exit the group without destroying it, you all sought to infuse fresh blood into the Lodge," Conan/Kogoro said. "Lohan couldn't accept it, however: the idea of his friends leaving the group, leaving him, with only a bunch of strangers remaining. This Lodge means something more to Lohan-san than it does to the rest of you, I suspect."

"This place is like home to me," Lohan confessed. "I was born in this country to Christian missionaries, and I've lived here all my life, to the point where I can hardly even speak English. But despite this, my whole life I've felt like an outsider in Japan. But then I discovered this place, this..amazing group of people. I love you all so much, more than I probably should."

"And that's why you've been blackballing all new group members," Sangoro said.

Lohan nodded. "I thought that if I kept you all from leaving, this dream wouldn't come to an end."

He became emotional. "I am sorry...so, so sorry! I've betrayed everything that the Freemasons stand for. Please forgive me! Please...forgive...!"

Then he broke into sobs.

He didn't say a word as the police escorted him to the station.

 **Ending**

( _Hoshi Monogatari_ by Egoist)

I know you've taken this from my cold dead fingertips

I wrote this to tell you what I never had the nerve to say

Because I know that right now, you're punishing yourself

Because you of all people deserve to know the whole story

Once I was only a child, but I was old enough to understand

Something important was missing, though I didn't know what

I wandered in the dark, calling to the crowd, "Excuse me, sirs!"

"Somebody, anybody, please, tell me what I'm doing wrong!"

Finally, on the starry night of Tanabata, I looked out my window

And said, "Kami-sama, if you could let me have a friend, just one.

One who's true and faithful, and funny, but most of all spirited.

This one thing I ask, and I'll never ask for anything ever again."

And then I met you, and in what seemed like an eternity I had

The chance to know you, and for the first time I was really happy

It never ended, you see, that initial bliss: it grew, as we grew closer

Thank you, my one and dearest friend, for teaching me how to love

 **The Next Day**

Shiro was enjoying the leisurely (in his perspective) pace at which he was jogging along the track when Genta caught up with him, a rather unexpected development.

"*pant pant* Boxing," Genta said.

"Hmm?"

"I want to take up boxing," Genta said. "To lose weight, maybe turn some of my fat into muscle."

"Are you sure about that?" Conan asked as he ran. "Boxing's rather violent. It's like a concussion waiting to happen."

"That's what the gloves are for, right?" Genta said.

Shiro grinned. "All right then. We'll start tomorrow."

Nancy tapped Conan on the shoulder. The two of them slowed down, so as to fall behind the others and talk in relative privacy.

"So what did you learn?"

"Huh?"

"Torishima-sensei," Nancy said. "Is he Mezcal?"

Conan shrugged. "Who knows? Aside from his background, I don't find anything suspicious about him. I guess at this point all I can do is stay put until a new development manifests itself."

Maybe Bourbon's right, Conan thought. Maybe this is just the calm before the storm. But I'd like to enjoy this calm as much as I can. Because I might never get another chance afterwards.

 **Scene Transition**

It was a dark and stormy night. He stepped out of the rain and into the dimly lit bar.

He sat down next to the long silver-haired man dressed in all black.

"Here you are," Torishima said.

The big-bearded man slid the package across the table and into Gin's hands.

"It's all here?" Gin asked, smoking a cigarette stoically.

"Yeah," Torishima said. "Just like you wanted: footage of Teitan Elementary and its student body, taken through a hidden camera. Am I finished now?"

"No," Gin said. "Stay onboard as a teacher a little longer."

After all, Gin thought, we don't know if this footage has what we need. It's imperative that our latest black sheep be brought back into the fold...dead or alive!

 **End of Episode**


End file.
